Spotlight on "Expanding Human"

By Larry Blamire

Larry, what are you thinking? Have you taken leave of your senses? Are you insane?

Questions I'm asked every day, of course, but in this case specifically regarding the utter foolhardiness of attempting to put a positive spin on "Expanding Human", an OUTER LIMITS episode usually croaked in the same breath as "Behold Eck!" or "Counterweight" as the most abysmal samples of Season Two.

Certainly nothing I say here will make you, the OL fan, "like" or even "go steady with" this lesser episode of the lesser season. I myself don't think it's great, wouldn't even call it good really. But in recent years some aspects of the show have come to appeal to me more and more.

Let me back up.

My favorite period for crime films is the 1950s when cinematic lawbreaking was dragged kicking and screaming into broad, cold daylight. It was a new realism, fueled by NAKED CITY and other location-based pseudodocumentaries, often with authoritative stentorian narration. The postwar shadowy, canted camera, crazy-quilt darkness of brilliant Anthony Mann/John Alton noir collaborations like T-MAN and RAW DEAL gave way to equally brilliant bleached black and white mean city streets of Don Siegel's THE LINEUP and Stanley Kubrick's THE KILLING. The Cold War down-and-dirty doc approach put an audience hungry for realism smack in the midst of the action--in their very own city, right around the corner or up the block.

The transition in OUTER LIMITS' season break (and regime) curiously resulted in something similar, though not entirely by design. In some cases, the shadowy, canted camera, crazy-patterned darkness of the Stevens/Stefano/Oswald/Hall period morphed into the warts-and-all starkness and minimalism of shows like "Expanding Human".

As a genre piece, it shares a berth with such 50s low budget location-fests as THE INDESTRUCTIBLE MAN, HAND OF DEATH and THE HIDEOUS SUN DEMON (or for studio fare, MONSTER ON THE CAMPUS), entertaining cheapies that share that monster-in-the-streets sense of simple fun. It was while enjoying a bout of these, wearing my appropriate Mindless 50s Fun Headset (you should see it, it's cool), that I saw "Expanding Human" as not an OUTER LIMITS at all, but a more superficial guilty pleasure--a harmless and diverting little grade B monster movie (much the way S1's "Specimen: Unknown" or "Tourist Attraction" resemble higher grade efforts).

BUT FIRST, THE NEGATIVES:

1) Yes, it would have been fascinating had the show tackled consciousness-expanding drugs with any kind of serious thought or imagination, as the setup promises. As DJS points out, it's merely a vehicle for Dr. Leary and Mr. Hyde, like the coelocanth blood that turns Arthur Franz into the previously noted campus monster. Sorry--no ALTERED STATE-of-the-union here, folks.

2) The "expansion" in question is pretty dubious. The UberClinton promises "a world of glories", but indicates executions, "maybe in the thousands". Let's face it, he may be psychic, super-strong, and smart--but really, folks, he's a monster pure and simple. in fact, I'd say the only thing NOT expanded is his consciousness.

3) As DJS notes, Homeier's leaps of logic via the Vegas angle are absurdly accepted by the authorities. Really?

4) Finally, even as a B movie cheapie I have to say the show somewhat lacks thrills. A couple more gratuitous monster attacks wouldn't have hurt. However, there is another aspect I will get to, that helps make up for this.

NOW, THE GOOD STUFF:

The opening is one big tease of a Season One reminder; dark and shadowy with creepy low angles. The murder of the watchman is chilling in its effortless simplicity, particularly the victim's nasty gasp. The shot of his feet lifting off the floor would become a cliche in cinematic demonstrations of great strength to come (yeah, yeah, Darth Vader). And that's it for shadows. No such darkness pervades the remainder of the episode.

But something else does. A strange mood. I can't quite put my finger on it, but there is a kind of bargain basement queasiness here that I find appealing, a kind of depressed ambience that seems to exude from its very blandness--a welcome relief from S2's preoccupation with cocktails and barbecues.

Take that pasty-faced LA courtyard I've grown fond of. It reaks of crime scene, just begging for police tape. You can't throw a knife in Hollywood or the Valley without hitting one of these places. Makes no difference how close it might be to Daystar or Paramount--all we know is its bleak neo-noir ambience of sun and seed would be right at home in Polanski's CHINATOWN, its dishwater dull interiors something out of Nathaniel West. Our first daytime view of a pumped-up Dr. Clinton is there, via a well executed obscuring by foreground lamp.

Another location that lends cheapie street cred is the office building; a real building with real elevators. There are no extras inside or out, no doubt due to budget, which also probably nixed us seeing the penthouse murder. But the emptiness, the strange desolation, help make up for that by fueling the vaguely dreamlike quality that lingers throughout the episode. It's there when Dr. Peter Wayne thinks he sees Clinton through the fountain (another nice foreground obscure), and when the elevator op and receptionist have no recollection of the murderous visitor. It's there too with the discovery of Akada's corpse lying peacefully in that bleak apartment at midday, not to mention his sudden return from the dead (the actor's rather strange delivery doesn't hurt).

These two different sensibilities working on me--low budget 50s monster movie and dream ambience--might not be as disparate as they first seem. Many of my favorite vintage scifi-horror films are marked by an undeniable surrealism. Here it seems somehow in keeping with Clinton's fugue state, his dissociative behavior. What's responsible for this? Purely an accident of budget? Oswald pitching, Peach catching, bases loaded in the ninth? A different colorful metaphor I can't think of?

The climax disappointed me initially; after effective shows of strength from our title character--well sold a couple of times by the strapping Keith Andes--culminating in a most impressive lift-and-toss of a cop through a window, the end seemed too quiet. Where's the hail of bullets for the monster that we've been leading up to? Now I think it's effective in its simplicity; the drug wears off and Clinton bleeds to death. Dream over B movie.

As a kid I confess I did not like Skip Homeier (or "poor Skip" as a veteran character actor friend of mine calls him). He was in one of the weakest episodes of my beloved COMBAT (no, not a Nazi--a GI) and probably the most embarrassing STAR TREK ever (again, not the Nazi one, "The Way to Eden"--I think Charles Napier sings). For me, there was just something about that great voice that sounded too controlled, too radio-announcerish. Homeier did play a few Nazis, but really he became more of a western guy, beginning with an important (almost iconic) portrayal in Henry King's THE GUNFIGHTER with Gregory Peck, as what would later become a stock character; the cocky young fast draw who wants to beat the top gun.

The years have softened my opinion of him. Just recently I caught an episode of THE VIRGINIAN where he was quite engaging as a dogged San Francisco police detective. Then there's the bizarro RAWHIDE episode "Incident of the Blue Fire" where he is subject of a truly startling climactic scene that I won't spoil, acquitting himself rather well. In "Expanding Human" his haughty superman has grown on me.

Keith Andes--who admitted to being mistaken for Homeier, and vice-versa--had a similarly rich baritone. But he usually came across as more natural, seeming to effortlessly convey both intelligence and sincerity. I enjoy those 1950s ZIV half-hour shows like HIGHWAY PATROL, shot on location which lend them some grit. In one of their lesser known series, THIS MAN DAWSON, Andes starred as a close-cropped supercop given unprecedented leeway in a fictional city overrun with criminal scum. I've seen some and they're fun, fairly violent procedurals. It also has one of the most ominous and intimidating title sequences for a TV series ever.

So you love it now, right? Cool.

Okay, I realize I'm largely reveling in surface quality, and limited at that--not to mention tweaked by my typically oddball perceptions. A quirky little B movie with at times the verisimilitude of a dream. I do know that I'd rather watch this one than a lot of S2; a favorite by default, perhaps?

As I said, I'm not trying to (or likely to) change anyone's opinion of this one. All I'm doing is offering a different wacky filter.